Thoughts, comments and observations about the Chicago White Sox from the Communications Department.

The Day After

Tuesday, April 3, 2007

Tough Day

To roughly quote Paul Konerko, "Good thing this game only counts as one loss because it felt like two."

And to cap my day off, had Ohio State made an outside shot or five, I would have finished second in the clubhouse pool, which scores huge bragging rights. Tough night all around.

Reader Responses

I asked our in-house website guy to read through your comments from yesterday and see what we could do to help. According to Dakin, someone from MLB contacted all of the people from the blog who brought up the Gameday Audio issue. In checking on the issue, they most often found that these were user-system issues, which are very common on Opening Day.

BAM recommended that we add a couple of links to the blog page for fans that may be experiencing these problems:

On the SPC Index page, we put a link up for people to access, but putting both links on the blog should help.

So here you go.

Opening Days

I should have done this over the weekend, but why don’t readers post their very favorite Opening Day stories (over your career as a fan), and we’ll recognize the very best stories? Yesterday before the game I saw a Sox fan in his/her dad’s arms at what was obviously a very first Sox game.

Do any of you have Opening Day memories or stories you want to share (remember with a PG audience)?

Yesterday, my kids voted that the best things were: 1. the food (they had been missing that special taste of a kosher dog at the ballpark) and 2. flyover (even made Tucson’s Davis Monthan Air Force Base look tame).

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9 Comments

My most memorable opening day would have to be Bo Jackson’s home run – in his first at-bat since having hip replacement surgery. It would have been better if Bobby Thigpen kept the ball in the yard (Sox lost) but it was nice weather and the park was full.

For me, no opening day compares to 2006. The memory of seeing the team on the field again as the WS Champs banner was uncovered still gives me goosebumps.

Every opening day, I love to just look around the ballpark and take in all that’s new and all that’s familiar from the past seasons. I think the new seats this year look fantastic. The various Sox logos used in the design are a wonderful detail. The new “Thunderstruck” montage with the players and the lighting is pretty awesome. I’d love to get into the Jim Beam Club to check that out. (Someone wanna spot me some cash?) Best of all, I love seeing the same fans again, not to mention those unique vendors. “Millah-Laaaaght.” The whole day feels like a family reunion.

I’ll limit my reply to just the ones I personally attended. (Although I can tell you stories from as far back as the mid 60’s…like when the Sox had the fans sing ‘God Bless America’ instead of ‘The Star Spangled Banner’ because they said the words were to hard to remember. Irving Berlin, the composer wrote the Sox begging them to go back to the National Anthem. The Sox wound up holding a contest asking the fans what they wanted…they preferred the ‘original’ anthem…anyway I digress)

The 1971 home opener saw the Sox play the Twins. My friends and I were sitting in the left center field lower deck. I couldn’t believe the number of fans who poured into the park that day.

Remember this team was coming off a 106 loss season, the worst in history. I remember the Sox winning the game in the 9th innng when Rich McKinney singled with two outs. You could have torn the place down.

The other one I remember was the 1973 home opener with the A’s. My friends and I took off school (Brother Rice high school) to get out to the park early. It was freezing!

Snow was shoveled along the wall separating the field from the box seats. We were in the first row of seats in right center field. The A’s came out to warm up and Catfish Hunter and Reggie Jackson were playing long toss right below us. Reggie was wearing one of those knit tam-o-shanter (spelling?) hats. For some reason my friends and I thought it was cool so at the same time we stood up, and yelled in unison to Reggie, “Hey Reggie, we like your hat!”

Reggie looked at us, laughed then came over to the wall and talked to us for about five minutes! That was the highlight of the day. We froze our buts off and the Sox got creamed 12-2. That was one of the worst home openers I’d ever seen. It ranked (no pun intended) right up there with the home openers in 1970, 1991 and Monday.

I purchased a Premium Sox Pride membership also and was having problems getting the gameday audio. I was told to purchase it again. I used the links you provided in the blog and I am STILL HAVING PROBLEMS . Keep getting the same pop up screen telling me to make a purchase. I hope this can be corrected soon.

I just want to add that I wonder why I would have problems now since I was using the game day audio througout spring training.Now I am told to repurchase it when I signed up in January and now I am told there is a problem with a credit card which I don’t understand because it went through OK after signing up for membership I received my transaction numbers and everything. I was able to purchase tickets on SOX PRIDE DAY EARLY PURCHASE.I do not understand the message I keep getting with gameday audio which comes included with my SOXPRIDE PREMIUM PACKAGE.

The Sox Pride Club is a scam. Please spread the word to other prospective club memebers. I have contacted them multiple times and never received an answer. The reason many people joined was to get an opportunity to buy Openin Day and Sox/Cubs tickets. We will never get the chance and they blatantly lied to all of us. The White Sox will not help with this either. Please make sure to spread the word that this whole thing is a scam by MLB and the White Sox are doing nothing about it.

Opening Day memories, from a reliable source… Brother Liptak mentioned the 1971 opener versus the Twinkies…
Bee Bee Richard was the winning run in the last of the 9th… yes,that’s right, the immortal Bee-Bee Richard… the next year,the year of the strike to delay the start of the season,they opened on the road at KC, then came back to the South Side to host the newly minted Texas (St)Rangers…a night game…Wilbur Wood, the portly portsider(that’s a left hander, for all you youngsters out there who don’t know old timey baseball lingo…)pitched a gem and the boys won by a 14 to 0 score…what the story was, however, was the weather…absolutely Eva Longoria/Hillary Swank/Jennifer Garner/Maria Wagener beautiful…72 degrees, nary a gust of wind…the rest of that homestand… we froze our rear apertures(hi,Dawn)off…with the winds whipping in off the lake, rain and all that other good stuff…

I also recall a come from behind win in the late seventies, with Ron Le Flore scoring the winning run on a little parachute single into LCF off the bat, I believe, of one Ron Blomberg,the DH…

(Liptak might recall that one with more detail…)…and,of course,the 1981 opener versus Milwaukee when Carlton Fisk hit a grand salami(hi,Bethany) to send the crowd into ectasy…

You all are probably wondering why I brought up weather conditions for my first memory…well,folks, thanks to the lovely Maria and the handsome Pat(an equal opportunity schmoozer, that’s me…), I will be making aguest appearance today at the South Pole…I mean the South Side, to watch the boys try to avoid frostbite and their second loss in succession…no sponsor’s product today for the old man(sorry,Miller…),just coffee and,hopefully, a WS winner…

By the way, Brother Liptak, if you look at the Cleveland game notes for Monday on MLB Press Pass,on the second page,where they list the notes at the bottom for the next game’s pitcher, the Cleveland PR department lists Westbrook as 0 and 4 versus the WS in ’06…
Retrosheet is wrong…I trust ALL PR people…(that is called schmoozing up to Bob Beghtol, as well as Mr Reifert, a former PR man…)

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